X Games: Sheckler still has street smarts

It was not the pain that was excruciating. It was the watching.

Ryan Sheckler sat on his couch in San Clemente for seven months and was forced to watch his friends compete on the Dew Tour and in the Maloof Money Cup. He occasionally would swim in the family pool to stay in shape.

But get on a skateboard? Fat chance. He admitted it hurt too much.

"It was a lot longer than I thought," he said of recovering from a broken right foot. "It was crazy. It was weird to sit on the couch wondering what these guys were doing and working on. I didn't think I would be able to keep up."

The 20-year-old, who burst on the action sports scene by dominating the X Games course in 2003 en route to a gold medal at the tender age of 13, reclaimed the top honor in X Games 16's street skateboard competition on Saturday atop the parking garage next to the Nokia Theatre.

Sheckler broke his right foot in two places during the third heat at last year's X Games. He knew immediately during the competition it was broken. Surgeons had to put screws in his foot to fix them. He had won gold in 2008 and silver in '07. He sat on that couch for seven months and said he did not begin feeling like his old self until the Dew Tour's Boston event just a few weeks ago.

"It just feels goods to be back on the board," he said.. "Not so much to win, although it is great to win. But the fact that being hurt and then going through all the steps to skating 100 percent again. And then skating with all these homies and making it to finals. I'm psyched."

Sheckler said he barely could ride while it was broken. He said the screws hurt too much,

"I would skate around the street, but I barely did anything," he said. It was hard, man. But it's good. We're here."

It was a crazy contest. The day started with 10 competitors in a pair of 18-minute heats. The top two and the highest-scoring third advanced to the finals for a 15-minute, five-rider heat.

Sheckler got the lead on the first round with a score of 90.66. He held until the third round when 15-year-old Nyjah Huston of Huntington Beach scored a 91.73 by taking successful rail slides to the forefront.

Sheckler then topped it with his take on the rail. He did a cab backflip fakie en route to a 92.66.

"When (Huston) threw down his banging run, yeah, the numbers were flying," Sheckler said. "It was just a crazy contest. It was hard to talk about topping it. I was just trying to do a different run from what I had done, to see if I could get a better score. I threw out a trick and changed it up, and that did it, so that was cool."

Sheckler then watched the scoreboard to look for the score. He raised his board after seeing it.

"Everyone was skating so well and I was nervous the whole time," Sheckler said. "The tricks being thrown down were sick. I loved it.

"It was totally in the judge's hands. I knew that's all I had and I knew it was the last run. I just wanted to try my hardest and it worked."

It was the second consecutive silver for Huston, who said he was not unhappy to finish second again.

"I was not thinking I could win," he said. "I was just happy I landed the run I wanted to do. I'm more used to jam sessions where you can bring out the best tricks you can do. I am actually surprised by the runs I landed, so I'm really happy."

The run that briefly put Huston in the lead included nollie backflips down the rails. But it was the quarterpipe, a huge broken teacup, that he said created his problems.

"The transitions were hard enough to figure out in your run and what to do with them," Huston said. "Street courses have nothing in those type of transitions."

In his winning run, Sheckler did a switch 180 transfer and then landed on the flat with a kickflip.

Ryan Decenzo of Vancouver, British Columbia, finished third with a 90.00 run, his first in the finals.

"It was fluky because I pretty much landed what I wanted to do," he said. "Then it was, `How can I better my own stuff?' I needed three minutes more of practice to figure it out. I didn't know what to do.

"Those guys were killing it."

Chaz Ortiz of Chicago, 15, had the best elimination score by nailing 360s over the double set of stairs, which included eight steps, but he seemingly could not keep it going in the finals and had an 89.66.

Sierra Fellers of Whitefish, Mont., finished fifth.

Saturday's gold medalists

BMX Freestyle Park: Daniel Dhers

Men's Skateboard Street: Ryan Sheckler

Rally Car Racing: Tanner Foust

BMX Freestyle Big Air: Chad Kagy

Rally Car Super Rally: Tanner Foust

source:

Daily News